Trego
byJ. D. Oliver
Trego
Copyright © 2011 by J. D. Oliver
ISBN-13 978-1-926918-34-1
First Edition
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Oliver, J. D., 1939-
Trego [electronic resource] / written by J. D. Oliver – 1st ed. Electronic monograph issued in PDF format. ISBN 978-1-926918-34-1 I. Title. PS3615.L4816T7 2011 813'.6 C2011-900971-4
Cover photo: © Donnie Sexton
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents and dialogues are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.
Extreme care has been taken to ensure that all information presented in this book is accurate and up to date at the time of publishing. Neither the author nor the publisher can be held responsible for any errors or omissions. Additionally, neither is any liability assumed for damages resulting from the use of the information contained herein.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the express written permission of the publisher.
Publisher: CCB Publishing
British Columbia, Canada
Contents
The snow had been falling for the last couple of hours and the shadows were getting long. My horse was lazing along like we had all the time in the world, which I guess we did, since I had no particular destination in mind.
There was about six inches on the ground. It didn’t bother my horse ‘Jim’. But Jake my dog wasn’t too happy with it. He had a heavy coat though, since he was part Newfoundland and Wolf, so I knew he wasn’t cold. He was just in a bad mood.
“Alright Jake, we’ll find a place to camp for the night.” He looked up at me and grinned. He liked his creature comforts. Jim shook the snow off of both of us. I had a couple of pansies on my hands.
They weren’t really, they had been through all of my travails with me. We had been drifting all summer and now it was late October. So I wasn’t too upset with this snow, it was sort of overdue. Especially since we were in the foothills of the Rockies.
I had been noticing some smoke up ahead for the last two hours. Which was unusual; since I had seen very few other humans since I had nailed the doors and windows shut on our home place. And one of those was Dad’s face as I closed the homemade casket.
After I had buried him; I turned all of the livestock loose to fend for themselves. They would be alright; there was plenty of forage and I had fastened the barn doors open so they could get in out of weather in the winter time.
Dad and I had built this place from scratch. I was only ten years old when we had left the so-called civilization. That had been twenty years ago. We had seen very few people come by our place since then. So being alone didn’t bother me none. But heck, it seems like the ones I did see on my few outings to civilization weren’t all that friendly.
We topped out on a tree covered slope above a little village down below. I made sure we stayed out of sight under a big Douglas Fir. That was a pretty neat sight. I had seen something like it on an old Christmas card that my Dad kept in the family Bible. In fact I took that Bible out of my saddle bags and looked at that card; it was almost a dead ringer for that village.
I turned the card over, it was from some woman from my Dad’s past. I didn’t know who she was, Dad didn’t talk too much about the past. I put the Bible back in my saddle bags. Then I checked the loads on both of my pistols. Then on my .50 caliber Sharps that was in the scabbard under my left leg. One just never knew, did one?
Jake looked up at me and then down at the village. “Just hold your horses old son, we don’t want to go barging in where we’re not wanted, do we?”
He whined and then looked back down at the small town. It was a pretty sight, which surprised me a little bit. I never liked civilization; it brought back bad memories, like I said, at times people just weren’t all that friendly.
There was a road that wound through the valley, it went right beside the village. Now this little burg lay at the foot of a small hill about a half of a mile long, most of the town was on the flat, with a lot of houses on the hill behind it. The buildings were in sort of a horseshoe shape with a square in the middle.
There were all kinds of animals; wild as well as domestic in that square. As well as a multitude of kids. Also close to the road; but still in the square was a Conestoga wagon, with a woman cooking over an open fire. Also another kind of a wagon, looked to be some kind of drummer. They had an outside fire going also.
